Wednesdays in the Word: Verse G

I was reading one of Beth Moore's blog posts a few weeks ago, and she shared that she'd just finished eighteen monthsof intense writing on a new study. I was fascinated, impressed, and jealous of an 18 month writing spree...but her next statement stuck fast in my mind: "God knew what the 18 months surrounding that project would entail and He sustained my family and faithfully carried us through a very rough season."

So. True.

When you and I rush headlong into something God has called us to do, we rush with eager anticipation. It's going to be good. Great, even. A time of productivity and purpose. And it can be all those things. But oh goodness. How very easily it can also be a time of unrequested, unforeseen, and unrelenting trial and testing.

I remember back in 2010, when Isaac came to me with the news that he needed to go into a wilderness and work through some issues...and I sat and wondered what I would do with the time on my hands while he was "wildernessing." A few days later, God invited me into a desert of my own. The invitation came almost as a relief at the time...an assignment was mine, and I was eager to jump in. Eager to learn and to prove I was willing to do my part. Eager to rush through whatever healing and growth God had mapped out for me...and most of all, eager to be on the other side, in the Promised Land, with Isaac.

And the longer that journey stretched, eagerness was replaced with exhaustion. I was so weary of waiting for a sign of hope that the relationship would be restored. I was weary of no sleep...no appetite...no desire for life. And in those moments when I desperately wanted to quit the desert tour that had once felt so inviting, I would pace the floor of my house and say through a clenched jaw, "GOD!!! FIND ME FAITHFUL!"

And in the end, that was all I cared about. God slowly knocked my will away from me and taught me that the restoration of that relationship was of far less value to Him than my faithfulness in serving Him during its time of testing.

And in those times, Satan tempted...and lied...and pulled at me from every direction, urging me to fail, to give up, to turn my back on God, to walk away from the relationship...and I begged for this:

In the end, the relationship did not survive. My heart was broken, and yet at the same time, relieved. Relieved, because I knew the very death I grieved so completely also freed me to move forward into God's future for me.

I look back on that time now and see how very completely God worked in me to prepare me for Ryan, and I don't wish that time away for one moment. I'm thankful for the tenacity it taught me.

God's calling on a life brings purpose beyond the end result. The journey to get there, with all its obstacles, is as important as the thing itself.

We can't know, going into the journey, what it's going to mean for us or those we love. We get caught up in the excitement of the calling and what we believe it will mean, and we don't think much about what it might cost.

That's why I chose this verse. What a prayer to pray over your own heart. It goes straight to the core of the matter. Guard me. Deliver me. Don't let me be put to shame. You're my refuge.

I would so encourage you to pray this over yourself in whatever journey you face. He is faithful.